Bewitching Season (16 page)

friend. She was also a very difficult dinner guest. “Drink your chocolate, and Andrews will be up

shortly to help get you dressed.”

Mama’s maid had been with her for as long as Persy could remember. As she helped them with

their silk stockings and slippers, chemises and corsets, starched petticoats and the luminous moon

white silk presentation dresses, she sniffed occasionally.

“I can’t believe you’re old enough to go to court. Seems like just yesterday you were coming

downstairs to dinner for the first time,” she said, eyes misty.

Persy grunted, holding the edge of the dressing table. Even when she was busy waxing sentimental,

Andrews could pull a corset tighter than their cook trussed her Christmas roast geese.

From downstairs she could distantly hear much bustle and movement: the florist arriving with their

elaborate bouquets, footmen delivering invitations, Kenney admonishing giggling maids, Mrs.

Huxworthy admonishing Kenney.

Then the court hairdresser arrived and unpacked his combs and pomades. Persy and Pen sat

unmoving, not daring to quiver as he flourished his curling tongs, arranging clusters of curls on either

side of their faces and pinning the required white plumes in their hair. Persy took a few experimental

steps when he’d finished, feeling the weight of her train and the unaccustomed feathers nodding and

earrings dangling at her ears. Their slight metallic jingle was distracting. Charles sidled into the room

and stared at them in silence.

“What? No witty remarks? No ‘You look like an escapee from the king’s menagerie’ comments?”

she said at the solemn expression on his face.

“No. I was just thinking about when you scolded me about your being grown-up now. You really

are, aren’t you?” he said, looking at the feathers.

The court hairdresser laughed and patted him on the head as he left to go do Mama’s hair. Then

Papa came into the room and shook his head, staring at them with the same expression as his son.

“Do we pass muster, Papa?” Pen asked, practicing her curtsy before him.

“Oh, er.” He fumbled in his pockets. Charles handed him his handkerchief, and he chuckled. “I

won’t deny seeing you girls looking like ladies isn’t choking me up a little. But I was looking for

something else.” He felt in his pockets again and pulled out two small tissue-wrapped packets.

Persy gasped in delight as the tissue revealed double strands of opalescent pearls. Even Charles

looked impressed as Papa clasped the necklaces around her and Pen’s necks.

“Oh, thank you,” she breathed, reaching up to touch their cool weight on her neck.

“Your uncle Charles Leland sent these for you last year when his ship was in China. He said that as

Leland girls were a rare and precious commodity, they ought to be treated accordingly. Well, I’d

better see that Kenney’s called for the coach. Don’t want to keep the queen waiting.” Lord Atherston

ducked his head and started toward the door, then came back and carefully kissed them both. Charles

handed him his hanky again, and he left the room, blowing his nose.

It turned out that Mama hadn’t exaggerated the dreadful traffic. Persy struggled not to lean back

against the carriage seat, lest she crumple her train or disarrange her hair. “Why are the roads so

crowded? Are that many people being presented today?” she asked.

“Oh, yes. But many come just to watch. Grandmama Revesby will surely be there, though I doubt

we’ll have a chance to do more than wave since she’s on duty with the queen.” Lady Parthenope was

torn between pride in her mother’s appointment as a lady-in-waiting at the largely Tory court and

loyalty to her own husband’s Whiggish leanings.

As the first hour turned into a second, even Pen’s excitement began to flag. They couldn’t even look

out the windows, which were shut and curtained against the crowds that lined the road to St. James’s

on drawing-room days to examine and discuss, in loud detail, the clothes and appearance of the

arriving presentees. But a rap on the carriage door startled them all. Mama peeked through the

curtain.

“It’s the court hairdresser. He stops at carriages to do any last-minute repairs to your hair or

feathers,” she reassured them as she opened the door to him. The hairdresser’s sallow face peered in

at them; he surveyed Persy and Pen, gave them an abrupt nod, and shut the door.

“I would suppose that means we’re all right,” Pen ventured.

“Thank heavens for small mercies,” Persy muttered.

Much to their relief they pulled up to the entrance of the palace shortly afterward. Liveried pages

pointed their way up long staircases and down longer corridors. Persy couldn’t help but feel amused

at the sight of so many girls all walking together with their feathers and trains over their arms, the

required lace lappet headdresses fluttering in the breeze of their passage, their pale-colored dresses

differing but somehow still looking almost identical.

“We look like a flock of birds migrating south for the winter,” Pen whispered to her.

“Birds, or lemmings about to go over a cliff?” she replied through stiff lips.

“Don’t be ghoulish.”

At long last they were ushered into the long gallery, immediately outside the Presence Chamber,

where the queen would receive them. Dozens of girls promenaded up and down its length, while

others clustered to compare dresses. A few looked close to tears; others chattered and laughed too

loudly.

Another hour ticked by with maddening slowness.

“Our dresses are among the prettiest,” Pen whispered after a while.

“Are they? Oh, good,” Persy replied, staring into her bouquet.

“What are you doing?”

“Pretending I’m an Indian fakir, like the one Uncle Charles told about in one of his letters. You

know, the man who could lie on a bed of needles without feeling any pain? Maybe it will make this

all easier.”

“My, what lovely pearls you’re wearing,” said a girl standing next to her. She was small and

plump and looked like a tame mouse in her white dress with touches of silver-gray. Her complexion

was a little gray, too, but maybe that was just the dress’s stark whiteness. Slightly protruding front

teeth completed the mousy image. “I envy you. Pearls look just dreadful on me.”

“Thank you,” Persy said, grateful for some distraction. “They were a gift from our uncle.” This girl

looked as nervous as she felt, which somehow made her feel better. At least she wasn’t the only one.

“He was in the China Sea with his ship and sent them to us.”

“Us? Oh!” She squealed as Persy gestured to Pen. “Twins! What fun! I wish I had someone to be

presented with, but all my female cousins are older than I am and my sisters younger. My name’s

Sarah Louder, but I’m called Sally. What’s yours?”

Pen told her, and she shook her head in admiration. “What romantic names! I hate Sarah, and I hate

Sally even worse. I should have liked to be named Euphemia, but I suppose it’s a little late now.”

“The Honorable Penelope Leland,” intoned a lord-in-waiting at the door to the Presence Chamber.

“Oh, you’re Honorables? My heavens. I’m just plain Miss. My papa’s Sir Henry Louder. Good

luck, then,” said the girl.

Pen took Persy’s arm and hurried her over to the door. The lord-in-waiting glanced at them, and an

amused expression replaced the bored one he’d worn all afternoon.

“How do you two know which of you is which?” he said with a grin.

Persy tried to smile politely. Sometimes being a twin could be annoying.

“Let me see. Oh, the ribbons are different. Jolly good idea, or you’d never know who was who.

Who’s Penelope?” He consulted the cards in his hand.

“I am.” Pen let her train, folded over her arm, drop to the ground. “Here I go!”

Persy watched while he handed the card with Pen’s name to a page, who handed it off to a

distinguished-looking man in knee breeches and with a beautiful jeweled sword at his side. Two

other gentlemen-in-waiting spread Pen’s train behind her with long sticks.

“The Honorable Penelope Leland,” the lord chamberlain cried into the room, and Pen walked into

the Presence Chamber, where the queen waited.

“Come on and watch your sister. You’re next anyway,” the lord-in-waiting whispered to Persy.

She hurried into place and felt the men behind her arrange her train.

Pen made her way up to a platform, above which hung a cloth of state. Below it stood a small

middle-aged woman with a large nose and heavy eyebrows, but with the sweetest expression in her

brown eyes that Persy had ever seen. Her dress and bonnet, though made of rich materials, were

disappointingly dowdy. Behind and to the sides of the royal dais were dozens of elaborately dressed

courtiers, gossiping behind their fans as they watched. Was Mama somewhere among them, standing

with Grandmama Revesby maybe?

Persy held her breath as Pen bent in her first curtsy. Queen Adelaide nodded to her as she rose and

moved apace to curtsy to the next royal lady on the platform.

A loud “The Honorable Persephone Leland” interrupted her thoughts. She hurried forward after

Pen, too intent to worry anymore, and started her curtsy to the queen.

The queen smiled when Persy rose. “Am I seeing double? A pleasure, since you’re both so pretty.

You must be my dear Jane Revesby’s granddaughters. She said you would be here today. I am

delighted to meet you.”

“Thank you, ma’am.” Persy barely was able to breathe. Grandmama had always loved the queen

for her kindness, lamenting that few could see past her homely face and unfashionable gowns. Now

Persy could see why she inspired such loyalty.

Persy shuffled sideways, looking for her sister. Pen had just finished curtsying to another elderly

woman standing beyond the queen and was preparing to catch her train, thrown to her by a page, and

back away. Persy curtsied to the woman, who peered at her with unexpected interest in her prominent

blue eyes magnified by spectacles, then murmured something to the attendant just behind her. One of

the king’s sisters, perhaps? Probably; King George III had fifteen children, of whom the present king

was one. Two of his daughters had never married. Papa had said one lived at Kensington. Princess

Sophia, was it?

The mousy girl, Miss Louder, was just making her curtsy to the queen. Persy managed to catch her

own train and backed away to the other door, where Pen was waiting for her.

“We did it,” Pen whispered as she took Persy’s arm. “I didn’t even have to use the spell Ally

taught us to make sure I caught my—”

“Hush—oh no … ,” Persy moaned under her breath, staring back at the royal dais.

Sally Louder had completed her last curtsy, to the elderly princess. But whether due to nerves or

shortsightedness, she had not properly caught her train when the page had tossed it to her, and was

about to take her first step backward away from the royal presence directly onto it. Disaster, at least

for poor plump Sally, was imminent.

Without thinking, Persy dropped her train and bouquet and held her hands outstretched before her,

pointing at the hapless girl. The dragging fabric of Sally’s train flipped up off the ground and hovered

at knee height as, oblivious of her peril, the girl backed away.

“Goodness, Perse! That was quick thinking,” Pen marveled.

“Thank you.” Quick it had been, but had it been wise? Ally had warned them about using magic in

public places. She glanced back up at the royal party where yet another girl was making her curtsy.

Queen Adelaide was smiling her gentle smile at the white-feathered head bowed before her. But the

woman next to the queen stared directly at her and Pen through her thick glasses.

Sally bumped into her, started, then smiled up at them over her shoulder. “I say, did you wait for

me? How kind.”

“You might want to check your train. It’s dragging a little,” Pen replied carefully. Beside her, Persy

lowered her hands and exhaled in relief as she bent to retrieve her own train and her bruised flowers.

The three eased out the doorway and back into the long gallery.

“Oh my heavens, I did it! Mama and Papa will be so happy. They were sure I’d do something

disgraceful. I could never get my curtsy right when I practiced it at home, and Mama was afraid I’d

end up showing the queen what my petticoats looked like,” Sally bubbled as they stood in the hall.

“Excuse me,” called a woman’s voice from behind them. They turned.

The older woman with the prominent blue eyes was hurrying toward them, trailed by her surprised-

looking attendant.

“Come on,” Pen whispered to Persy and Sally, and sank into another curtsy.

The woman came up to them as they rose. Persy’s heart pounded in her throat. She must have seen

her spell to keep Sally from tripping on her train. Was she going to say something about it in this very

crowded, very public place?

“Did I hear that you are Lelands?” the woman said, looking at Persy.

“Yes, ma‘am,” Pen said, “we are, ma’am.”